Forms are an integral part of a website. For many site owners, this means doing some research in order to find the best form plugin for your WordPress site that will meet your needs.
The good news is that if you use WordPress.com to build your website, you get a built-in form block as part of the default Block editor, which we’ll discuss in more detail below.
If you want additional functionality, or you’re not yet using WordPress.com, you’ll need a form builder plugin. Since there are hundreds of contact form plugins for WordPress websites, evaluating different options and picking the best form plugin for your business can be overwhelming.
WordPress.com offers upgrade options to give you the freedom to build the site you want. Plans vary, but possible features include: the ability to use any WordPress theme or plugin – including the form plugin of your choice. Other essential business tools are also available for SEO, social media scheduling, and site statistics. A range of storage to meet your needs, best-in-class security, lightning-fast hosting, and multiple options for resources and getting the support you need. Whatever your vision for your form-enriched website, WordPress.com has you covered.
In this post, we’ll walk you through the best WordPress form builder plugins, along with their pros and cons, to help you make an informed decision.
But first, let’s take a look at the default form that comes built-in with any WordPress.com site, regardless of plan options.
As we mentioned above, WordPress.com comes with a built-in form block that you can use to add simple contact forms anywhere in your site. You can use this block to create different types of forms such as a contact form, event registration form, feedback form, appointment booking form, and more.
To use this feature, click the + Block Inserter icon when editing a post, page or widget area and search for “Form”. Then click on the Form block to add it.
You’ll be presented with some pre-designed form options, or you can skip this step and start from scratch.
Once you’ve selected the type of form you need, use the settings panel on the right to configure options such as email notifications and what will happen after form submission. To learn more, read our guide to the WordPress.com Form block.
As you can see, WordPress.com makes it easy for you to create simple forms without any coding. But in some cases, you might need complex features such as conditional logic, math calculations, or the ability to attach files. That’s when WordPress’s integration with powerful third-party form plugins will come in handy.
Each WordPress form plugin comes with its own unique set of functionalities. Here are the main features you may want to consider:
It’s important to keep your business needs in mind when evaluating these features. For example, if you’re running an employment website for employers and employees, you’ll need forms like the employer registration form and a job application form. Similarly, e-commerce merchants will need specific forms like order placement, user login, and more.
Without further adieu, let’s dive into a detailed overview of the best form plugins for your WordPress site. This list includes basic plugins with bare-minimum features, advanced custom form building solutions with extensive customization, file submission, conditional logic, and everything in between. While we list a number of the features available for each form plugin, be sure to visit the plugin links provided to further investigate additional features for each.
Jetpack is a powerful multi-purpose plugin for WordPress websites. It has a number of different functionalities, one of which is a WordPress contact form with a drag-and-drop editor you can use to add, edit, and reorganize form fields. It’s also the built-in form block that comes with all WordPress.com sites, which means no plugin add-on is needed if your site is hosted with WordPress.com.
You can create unlimited forms and embed them in different areas of your website. The plugin uses native WordPress settings to send email notifications when a form is submitted.
Features:
WPForms is a beginner-friendly WordPress form plugin offering both a free version and a premium version. The free, WPForms-Lite plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace. It has a powerful drag-and-drop form builder workflow to make WordPress forms without coding.
With WPForms, you can create different types of mobile-responsive forms with ready-made templates for survey forms, order forms, email subscription forms, donation forms, and more.
Features:
Formidable Forms is an advanced online forms plugin for WordPress that allows you to make complex forms easily. Both a free version and a premium version are available. The free, Formidable Forms plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace. In addition to receiving form data on the backend, Formidable allows you to show submitted information on the front end.
There are lots of really powerful features to make sophisticated forms for not just a website, but also for data-driven web apps like directories, listings, etc.
Formidable Forms also comes with premium add-ons that you can purchase separately. You may not need them as a small business, but as your business grows, the whole package with extra add-ons can get expensive.
Features:
Gravity Forms is a popular, premium contact form plugin for WordPress that is good for both beginners and advanced users. Its drag and drop form builder allows you to create forms without any programming knowledge.
An advantage it has over other plugins is that some of the top premium WordPress themes are optimized for Gravity Forms. It includes features that allow you to create advanced forms, such as conditional logic, numeric calculations, and more.
If you are running a real estate website, for example, you can set up a form to calculate mortgage payments from user input in fields such as purchase price, interest rate, down payment, and mortgage period.
Features:
Ninja Forms is yet another form plugin for WordPress that lets you create contact forms with ease.
The core plugin is free and the Ninja Forms plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace. You can extend the feature set with various premium add-ons as required. These include multi-page forms, conditional logic, front-end post submission, user analytics, and more.
If you’re unsure about what type of needs you’re going to have in the future and just want a free contact form plugin, then Ninja Forms is a good fit for you. You can always extend its features later by buying the add-ons you need.
Features:
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Contact Form 7 is one of the most popular contact form plugins for WordPress, and has been around for 10+ years. It’s also totally free. Because of its popularity, there are several premium 3rd-party add-ons you can find to enhance its features. The Contact Form 7 plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace.
It was one of the first free contact form plugins in the WordPress plugin repository. The basic user interface hasn’t changed much since then, while newer and better plugins have flooded the market. But if you just want a basic contact form at no cost and don’t mind learning a bit of HTML, then Contact Form 7 is what you need.
Features:
WS Form is relatively new to the WordPress community but it is off and running with an amazing feature set. The free version is powerful on its own, but the Pro version takes it to levels that, in some cases, are unrivaled. Developers, especially, will find powerful features that they’ve never had access to before. But if you aren’t a developer, don’t let those words stop you. It’s an intuitive and powerful no-code form builder for non-developers, with all the extras a developer might want or need as well.
Features:
ARForms is a WordPress form plugin available in both free and premium versions. The free, ARForms plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace. The plugin is simple to use, even for beginners. You can create a range of different types of forms such as contact forms, pop-up forms, order forms, subscription forms, survey forms, and more.
Additionally, you can create advanced forms with videos and maps by making use of helpful form-creation workflows. If you’re comfortable with advanced customization, you have the ability to style forms with custom CSS.
Features:
HappyForms is a free and simple contact form plugin for WordPress. The free, HappyForms plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace. A plugin-enabled plan is also available. It comes with a drag-and-drop form builder with customization options and a variety of form fields.
It allows you to add the contact forms to your posts, pages, template files, and widgets. The best part is that you can build multi-column forms with a single click.
You get features to create conversational forms and check a live preview before publishing a form. Upon form submission, users can be shown a custom message or redirected to any URL.
Features:
weForms is a free drag-and-drop form builder plugin for WordPress. It also has a premium version. The free, weForms plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace.
With weForms, you can create as many forms as you want and embed them anywhere on your WordPress website. These include payment forms that can integrate with PayPal or Stripe. There is also an option to preview the form before you publish it.
The form builder has predefined templates to create common types of forms with ease. Using the expiration feature, you can make a form invalid past a certain date. And you get integrations with third-party email solutions and other services.
Features:
FormCraft is a premium form plugin that’s unique because of its specialty in design. The forms created with FormCraft look better than the generic forms you generally see on the web. There is a free version available too, and the free, FormCraft plugin is available within the WordPress.com Plugin Marketplace.
The drag and drop form builder, along with a wide range of ready-made templates, makes it easy to create any type of form without coding. You can create and embed multiple forms on your website.
Another notable benefit of FormCraft is the popup form. You can configure the form to appear in a popup based on an action taken by the user.
Features:
Quform is a premium but affordable WordPress plugin that allows you to build mobile-responsive contact forms with a drag and drop form builder. The dashboard is easy to navigate as you build different types of forms.
You can build several advanced contact forms without coding, including multi-page forms. It comes with many different themes to change the form styling.
Features:
That completes our overview of the best form plugins for WordPress that we recommend considering. Learning about and comparing the different features in various form plugins can be overwhelming. So here are some quick suggestions to make it easy for you.
For a simple contact form that doesn’t cost anything, pick Jetpack Forms or WPForms free version. If you’re a WordPress beginner with a reasonable budget, go with the WPForms premium version. If you’re an advanced user or developer trying to create complex forms, there’s no better option than Formidable Forms. Also, be sure to follow best practices when choosing plugins.
Hopefully this information will help you zero in on the best form plugin for your WordPress site. Remember that WordPress.com offers you the best options to create a WordPress website that includes forms with simple built-in tools on any plan, to a robust form solution using plugins on eligible plans.
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